Whom My Soul Loveth
by Marguerite1
Summary: Dr. Scully in full battle armor during "Brand X."


**Whom My Soul Loveth**

Classification: Post-ep for "Brand X"   
Summary: Dr. Scully in full battle armor. 

***   
Asheford Hospital   
*** 

"What part of 'now' did you not understand?" 

Skinner has seen her in motion before but not like this, not with such a   
combination of urgency, terror, and competence. The emergency team has scarcely   
taken Daryl Weaver's vital signs but she is already halfway out the door, cell   
phone to her ear, talking to a lab technician. "I want it up there YESTERDAY.   
I'll be there in three. Yeah, you heard me." She sets her mouth in a tight line   
as she hears a reply that does not please her. "Just DO it. I'll take full   
responsibility." 

In three quick strides he catches up with her determined step. "You're sure   
about this?" 

"It all makes sense," she replies as she pokes the elevator button three times   
with a rigid finger. Dissatisfied with its slow response, she heads for the   
stairs, making the phrase 'running commentary' seem particularly apt as he lopes   
forward to keep up with her. "If the test subjects who died were light smokers   
and the men who were just exposed to secondhand smoke weren't smokers at all,   
then what other answer can there be?" 

Skinner reaches for the door to the stairwell but Scully ducks under his arm and   
shoves it open herself. "What course of treatment are you going to try?" he   
calls after her. 

"We're basically going to pump nicotine in him until we kill those bugs." 

Or him, Skinner thinks, but he does his damndest to push that idea aside. They   
reach the ICU and Scully storms into Mulder's room with Skinner at her heels   
like a mastiff. 

"Where's the damn cart? We're in a rush - let's move it!" 

Two nurses roll equipment into the room and a breathless woman appears with a   
large vial. Scully snatches it from her hand and begins to fill a syringe with   
the amber substance, looking into the tube as she addresses the man who lies on   
the bed. A respirator forces air in and out of lungs that sound as if they have   
no more room. 

"Mulder, it's me. We've got something to try. It's not going to be a lot of fun   
but it could well save your life." 

Skinner winces at the painfully shallow breaths that are scarcely enough to   
cause Mulder's chest to rise and fall. Mulder's lips, distended into a painful   
grimace around the tubes, are a ghastly shade of cold blue. 

When the syringe is full she lets herself look down at her partner, wrapping her   
fingers around his ghostly hand. "Mulder...Mulder, can you understand me?" 

Mulder's fingers tighten in response. Scully leans over him and whispers   
something that makes Mulder squeeze her hand a second time. His eyes are bright   
with fear above the tubes that breathe for him with decreasing effectiveness,   
but something in Scully's words seems to calm him. 

Scully empties the syringe into Mulder's IV bag. In seconds he starts to shake   
uncontrollably, arms and legs flailing. "Dr. Scully, we need to secure him,"   
says one of the nurses as she tries unsuccessfully to hold Mulder still. 

"Not yet..." She tries to subdue him with caresses and soft sounds, but to no   
avail. She looks pleadingly at Skinner. "Sir! I need your help!" 

A nurse lets Skinner take Mulder's legs but he is stronger than they expected,   
adrenaline giving him a force they cannot rein in. Mulder's arms sweep across   
the bed and he tries to grab at the tubing down his throat in spite of their   
combined efforts to calm him. "Mulder, don't! We're trying to help you!"   
Skinner's entreaty is lost on the desperate, panicking man. 

Scully's eyes well up but her voice is steady. "Get the restraints." She looks   
over at the heart monitor. "I'm going to hit him again. Thirty cc's." 

With Skinner's help the nurses are quiet and efficient as they strap Mulder's wrists   
and ankles to the bed. Skinner finds it hard to look either at either of his   
agents, the one who struggles for each breath and the one who is trying so hard   
to save his life, but he must. They are his responsibility. His team. 

Scully listens to Mulder's lungs through a stethoscope, frowning. "There's   
progress; I think it's..." 

Her words are cut off by Mulder's violent burst of coughing. Scully steps back   
just in time to keep from being hit in the face by a stream of insects as they   
pour out of Mulder's nose and from around the tubes in his throat. 

"God!" shouts one of the nurses as she jumps backwards. Skinner fights down the   
sour taste of bile as he starts to stamp on the bugs. His shoes nudge them but   
they do not move. 

"Scully. Look at this." 

She spares a glance at the floor and at the still, black creatures on Mulder's   
sheets. "They're dead." For just an instant a smile blooms on her face, but   
within seconds she is back in control. "Mulder, listen to me. What you coughed   
up this time were dead bugs. It's good, Mulder, but we have to give you another   
dose to make sure the eggs and larvae die, too." 

His head moves up and down, a sickeningly wet sound emerging from his damaged   
lungs as he tries to take a breath on his own. Scully nods at the nurses and the   
three of them start to take hold of the tubes. "We're gonna take these out. We   
need you to cough for us." 

She must see the baleful look Mulder gives her, because her lips part in a   
smile. "I don't care if you cough up bugs. On three. One. Two. Three!" 

It sounds like the last wheeze of a drowning man, but Mulder manages to free   
himself of the hated tubes and take a few tentative breaths on his own. Nurses,   
having trouble containing their disgust, wipe away the little maggots that have   
come out with the air while Scully clamps an oxygen mask on him and smooths his   
hair around the elastic bands. "That's it, that's good. That's good. Now we're   
gonna take out the last of the little bastards." 

"Hang on, Mulder," Skinner mutters, watching in concerned fascination as Scully   
prepares another syringe and injects its contents into the IV bag. 

For a few moments Mulder is calm, his chest no longer heaving with the effort to   
inhale. Skinner observes Scully as she monitors Mulder's progress with obviously   
feigned clinical detachment . "I think I hear it opening up in there. Mulder,   
you still with us?" 

He is still. The room is silent for a long, horrifying moment before the machine   
alarms begin to shriek. 

"He's not breathing, Dr. Scully!" 

"Damn!" She turns up the flow of oxygen but Mulder does not respond, his face   
taking on a sickly pallor. "What's his pulse?" 

"Sixty and dropping. Fifty-six..." 

"Damn it, Mulder..." 

"BP's bottoming out!" 

"No! No, Mulder, you're not gonna do this!" Scully puts a mask over her mouth   
and leans over to perform artificial respiration, then at the last second rips   
the fabric away and places her lips over his. 

"Dr. Scully! You can't risk infection..." 

"Shut UP!" Her scream is loud enough to drown out the shrilling alarms. Taking a   
deep breath, she bends over and tries to transfer her life into his body. 

"Pulse is weakening," announces a nurse. 

"Call in a damn code! NOW!" 

As the crash cart team enters, a nurse pushes Skinner toward the door. "You need   
to wait outside, sir. Please." 

"I'm not going anywhere," he growls through gritted teeth. 

"You're in the way. We need room to work." 

His expression says fuck you but he steps away just far enough for the team to   
work. 

From the bank of monitors comes the call of another nurse. "We're losing him!" 

"Mulder, come on, come ON!" Scully continues to breathe for him as an orderly   
brings her the equipment. "Bag him! Somebody get that suction equipment, stat!" 

Before Scully's commands can be carried out, Mulder's whole body heaves upward   
and he takes in a ragged breath, his eyes flying open in panic. 

"He's back," Scully whispers. "Mulder, lie still. Don't try to move. You're okay   
now, you're okay...it's all right..." 

"BP one-ten over eighty...respiration is almost normal. What the hell happened,   
Doctor Scully?" 

Skinner can tell that she is beyond hearing them, that her whole being is   
focused on Mulder's terrified eyes as she listens to the sweet sound of his   
breathing. By degrees his anxiety dissipates and he relaxes enough for Scully to   
motion Skinner forward to help remove the straps that bind him to his bed.   
"You're gonna be just fine now, Mulder. I want you to try and sleep. Can you do   
that?" 

He nods, moving his lips silently and frowning in frustration when nothing comes   
out of his abused throat. He lifts one hand, slowly, as if he has to concentrate   
on the movement, and brushes his fingers against her cheek. Skinner blinks   
rapidly, blood rushing to his face at witnessing such an intimate gesture. He   
sets his jaw and turns his head away, but even then he sees them reflected in   
the window of the ICU, Scully grasping Mulder's fingers and putting them just   
above her heart. 

The nurses bustle with choreographed efficiency while Scully directs the orderly   
to dispose of the beetles and their offspring in a hazardous waste container and   
have the container put in a deep freeze just in case there were still live   
specimens. "Burning won't kill them, obviously," she tells Skinner, her hands   
drawing a wreath of smoke in the air. "I'll see that someone from the local   
health department gets them - maybe they can find a safe, permanent method of   
destroying these hybrids." She remains connected to Mulder the entire time,   
touching his wrist even though his pulse is monitored electronically. 

"I'll get someone right on that." Secretly he is glad of the chance to escape   
that room and the inhabitants who are so utterly wrapped up in each other. He   
opens the door for the nurses and the orderly, then follows them out into the   
corridor. His fingers fly over the keypad of his cell phone with practiced ease.   
His glance returns to the ICU window even though he knows he should not look,   
and he sees Mulder's grip on Scully's fingers relax, his hand slowly lowering to   
the bed as he falls asleep. 

He hates himself for watching, for making himself into a voyeur, but he can no   
more look away than he can tear out his own heart - although his heart tears   
anyway at the sight of Scully anointing Mulder's temple with the lightest of   
kisses before crossing herself as she watches him breathe. He busies himself   
with the phone, leaves his badge number with the local health authorities, and   
pretends to be busy when Scully finally joins him. 

"He's stable," she says in response to his questioning glance. Skinner can see   
that she is trying to look in the window, so he shifts his position slightly to   
angle her toward the best view of the bed. "That was a pretty bad scare, but the   
worst seems to be over. I'm getting an order for more chest x-rays to make sure   
the larvae are expelled and he'll probably need at least one more deep suction   
treatment just to make sure." 

Skinner nods. "You were...great in there," he says, trying not to cringe at the   
sheer inanity of his words. 

Scully's teeth pull at her lower lip and she gazes at Mulder's still form. "It's   
what I do. What I used to do." At Skinner's sudden shudder she looks up at him   
as if for the first time. "What is it?" 

He shrugs his shoulders and puts his hands on his hips, looking just beyond   
Scully's head. "Déjà vu. Georgetown Memorial, the night you fainted during the   
hearing. Mulder and I were looking at you through a window just like this one." 

Her head droops and she puts her fingertips to her eyelids. "We spend too much   
time in hospitals." When she opens her eyes again, her face is anguished. "I'm   
tired," she says in a voice so low he has to bend over to hear her. 

"Let me take you back to the hotel..." 

"No, I want to stay here." 

"Then let me get you something to eat. You've been on your feet..." 

She shakes her head, her eyes wide and shimmering. Skinner takes a step toward   
her as if fearing she will collapse, but she moves backwards with her hand up in   
front of her face. Pivoting on her heel, she looks first one way and then the   
other until she finds a direction and begins to take quick steps. Skinner stays   
a few paces behind her and watches as she put her palm against a door. 

Chapel, reads a discreet sign just above the entryway, and Skinner starts to   
enter with Scully, wanting to be there if she falters, but something holds him   
back. He waits until Scully turns around to face him, trying not to let the pain   
in her expression shatter his resolve. Through sheer force of will he inclines   
his head toward the door and for an instant he feels the kind of wordless   
communication that Scully and Mulder share as she thanks him with the smallest   
of smiles. 

Just before closes the door behind him, he sees out of the corner of his eye   
that she falls to her knees, half in exhaustion and half in prayer. When he   
hears her sob he almost loses his resolve, but instead he stands watch at the   
door, jaw set, shoulders back. His face is that of a sphinx, stony and resolute,   
masking the tornadic activity of his mind. 

They came because of him and now Mulder's life is in jeopardy - and Scully's,   
too, in a way, for they are bound together at a level that transcends mere   
human understanding. He takes off his glasses for a moment. Rubbing his eyes   
only spreads the graininess around. He wonders what the eggs inside Mulder's   
lungs feel like, if they're hard and sharp, then a new wave of guilt crashes   
around him. 

Scully emerges from the chapel, her makeup slightly smeared. Her expression is   
composed in spite of the redness at the rims of her eyes, a redness that   
intensifies the blue until it is like Caribbean waters struck by the first rays   
of dawn. She looks at her superior and offers him a small smile. "I'm okay." 

He allows himself to smile back. "I don't suppose I could persuade you to go   
back to the hotel and get some rest." 

"Not a chance." She shakes her head and brings her fingertips to her lips as she   
fights back a yawn. "I'm just going to sit with him for a while. He doesn't wake   
up well in hospitals and he doesn't always remember what's happened. I'd better   
be there." 

Skinner nods. He wants more than anything else in the world to draw her into his   
arms and hold her safe, but it is not to be. Already she is halfway down the   
hall, homing in on Mulder's room and tuning out the rest of the world. 

His world. He buttons up his jacket again and starts to leave, then decides to   
enter her world for just a moment, to get some insight into her strength and   
maybe to borrow some for himself. 

It's a standard hospital chapel, non-denominational and somewhat sterile. He   
imagines that the kneeler is still warm from her body but he will not let   
himself touch it. Instead he turns toward a plain walnut stand and the memory   
book placed there. People have left messages and Bible verses for others to   
read, and the last entry is in Scully's handwriting, small and precise just as   
she is herself. 

"I will rise now, and go about the city, In the streets and in the broad ways, I   
will seek him whom my soul loveth. The watchmen that go about the city found me:   
'Saw ye him whom my soul loveth?' Scarce had I passed from them, When I found   
him whom my soul loveth: I held him, and would not let him go." 

Someday, he thinks as he takes a seat in a pew and leans forward to rest his   
head on his clasped hands, he will find a way to thank them. But for now he just   
closes his eyes and imagines Scully holding on to Mulder's life, to his soul,   
and never letting him go. 

*** 

Thank you again and again and again, jordan. What would I do without you?   
The quotation is from The Song of Songs: 3:2-3.   
Feedback will be adored and lovingly answered at marguerite@swbell.net.   
Return to Post-Eps.   
  



End file.
